The Art of Throwing Away

[Eraser Heed]

   I have always had a collectors mind in wich I have put great meaning into material things. Collections of early stamps from the Swedish post, Pepsi-Cola bottles from foreign countries, drafting tools from the 1910s to 1970s to mention some. But sooner or later I had always found myself thrown into a situation I could not handle. The stamps got too expensive and suddenly I had paid 600 Euros in an auction for a thin and smelly piece of paper, the bottles of Pepsi turned into demons in my dreams in wich I crawled around in warehouses trying to catch them before they smashed. The intricate mechanisms of the drafting pencils occupied my mind to the extent that I stopped drawing.

   I just always had to sell, give away or throw my collections at the end to survive, and this has set its marks. I was afraid of loosing myself to materia. Soon I could not even keep a normal set of furniture in my home before I figured out ways of how to dispose them. I was afraid they would take over my life. I had become a minimalist!

   To come over this I started with self therapy and I did it by beginning playing disc golf. It's a playful sport in wich You continously throw away an object (the Frisbee) and retreat the same. This worked fine before I discovered the joy of collecting frisbees, old and new, different molds, wheights, flightabilities...

My traditionally art work has always had a collectors mind attached to it. When I exhibited I did not sell anything so I have always been stuck with my art and keeping every art work I have done has not been good for my progressiv thinking. They soon become a collection that occupied my mind. I have for a long time been fascinated by mail art and parallell to one of my exhibitions I sent out 150 invitations to small islands in the pacifics and carribians as well as madagaskar and this triggered the outcome; no visitors to my gallery but a lot of people recieving strange invitations to a cold and wintery landscape.

In later days I have discover the joy of being answered by a fellow artist and the throwing the art away has turned into mail art.

Thanks for a wonderful site Ruud and thank You older members for a warm welcoming!

Niklas Heed

[Valentine Mark Herman]

STOP! I can't email you the book. I was only trying to email you the introductory chapter, and it's way too long for Mr Yahoo to handle; the book has approx 250 A4 size pages ind includes a 100 or so images. I might be able to get it on a CD, but don't know how to do that, so will have to ask someone.

Niklas: I seem to remember an earlier discussion somewhere here about how people store their Mail Art, but where it is I do not know. As I don't believe there is much original left in the world to do or say these days, it's well worth relaunching it.

YOU, Niklas, should start a Group. It's dead easy (I've done it a few times). All you need is a 1-2 sentence 'Mission Statement' and an avatar, and off you go. The Group will run itself when crazy people like Vizma and Val join in, and as Administrator you won't have to do anything, but sit back and smile. Go on, do it!

Val

[vizma bruns]

Sometimes very cruel people, (like my sister) call us hoarders, but I'll be using your lovely term, Niklas..... Collectors' Syndrome!

 "My name is Vizma and I have Collectors' Syndrome!"

Yes please Val, email me your book, I'd love a copy!

[Eraser Heed]

@Val -Loking forward to a copy of Your book! We who suffers the collectors syndrome just has to learn to handle and live with it :(    ...but it is also :)

@Vizma Bruns -I think we already have this collecters club at IUOMA and we have plus 40 000 pictures in it ;), would be nice to see how people arranges their incoming mail art they do not add on and sends away. Maybe that could be the club. :)

@ Erni bär -Thank's for the view from an opposite direction with the Kabakov exhibition  Horders and minimalists have much incommon.

[Valentine Mark Herman]

I remember seeing this, Erni; It's in Oslo now, I think.

I wrote a self-published book a couple of years ago called 'Collections... and Collectors'., to which I got some riends to contribute. It was supposed to 'cure' me of my collection addiction. It didn't: it made things even worse;

I'm trying to sort out the Intro -- which is full of photos -- to send to Niklas, but am having trouble with the size of it.

If anyone else is interested in (eventually) receiving a copy of it, then please let me have your email address.

And to take up Vizma's suggestion, yes I'd be interested in a Collectors group, but surely it would have to have a Mail Art theme? 

You might be interested to know that there was a Mail Art Exhibition in the Netherlands earlier this year on the theme of collecting. You can find it if you Google Van Abbemuseum Collecting Mail Art Project.

Val (see, I even collect exhibitions about Mail Art!)

[vizma bruns]

Thanks for this blog Niklas, you are not alone! If you started a collectors' group here, I'm sure you'd get some very interesting photos!! I'd definitely join!!!